


A Chance (The Last One We'll Ever Get)

by EachPeachPearPlum



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Episode: s05e11 The Drawing of the Dark, F/M, Fix-It, M/M, Optimism, past canon character death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-10
Updated: 2018-10-10
Packaged: 2019-07-29 01:48:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,163
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16254191
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EachPeachPearPlum/pseuds/EachPeachPearPlum
Summary: Kara is captured and awaiting execution. Mordred has begged one major power in Camelot for her life and failed. Now it's time to try the other one.(In other words, the way the conversation between Merlin and Mordred could have gone if Merlin was a better person)





	A Chance (The Last One We'll Ever Get)

**Author's Note:**

> So this isn't the fic I set out to write. My plan was for something Merlin/Mordred-y, with a happy ending and so on. Unfortunately, when I actually sat down and rewatched the episode (I've only seen it once, because I spent the entirety of s5 yelling at Merlin not to be such a git) that was not the story that wanted to be told. So I went with what the characters wanted, and here it is...

"Tell me you wouldn't do the same," Mordred says. "For the woman you love."

He's so desperate, so young. An idealist, still, wide-eyed and optimistic, a part of him determinedly believing in the inherent goodness of people and the underlying fairness of life.

Merlin misses that feeling.

Once, years ago, before Morgana and the dragon, he had been in love. Back when Arthur was only the prince and Merlin had barely started cutting away pieces of his soul in the name of destiny, he believed like Mordred does.

Now he can barely even remember what Freya looked like.

He knows she was beautiful, whether it was dressed in rags or Morgana's silk, dirty and tear-streaked or scrubbed clean and laughing at his magic's inability to tell the difference between strawberries and roses. He remembers that she was pale-skinned and dark-haired, remembers her being so painfully slender he could count her ribs when he held her. These, the facts of her appearance, are still there, but the precise shape of her face and shade of her eyes are lost to him, along with the sound of her voice and the dangerous glory of her other form.

It's not so much of a surprise, since the boy who loved her died almost as long ago as she did.

But he did love her, all those years ago. Enough to give up his home and his friends, turn his back on the destiny that has since swallowed him whole. If not for her curse, they would have built the little cottage by the lake that they'd talked about, would be married and raising a family together, content with the path they walked and the decisions they'd made.

If not for Arthur.

And the morning after Merlin's destiny killed the love of his life, Merlin pasted on an imitation smile and went right back to working for him. Because he loves Arthur, respects him, has a duty to keep him safe and well and help him usher in Camelot's future of peace and prosperity. Because fate has worked so hard to make sure Merlin has never actually had a choice.

He should kill both of them now, before Mordred has the opportunity to make good on Kara's failed attempt on Arthur's life, because Merlin might have locked his grief and anger and terrible, hopeless loneliness in a box and carried on serving Arthur but he doesn't think Mordred will do the same.

Merlin should have killed him as soon as he saw him after that vision, before they got back to Camelot. He should have killed him on any and every day since then, the very first time he got the chance.

For all that he's killed before, for all that he fears the future he's seen, Merlin still can't bring himself to do it. If Mordred was standing over Arthur with a sword, Merlin wouldn't hesitate to kill him the way he's killed so, so many others, but not like this. Whatever he may have become in the years since he met Arthur, whatever soft, kind, decent parts of himself he has compromised or cast aside, he's not yet so lost as to stoop to cold-blooded murder.

The closest he's got is when he took the opportunity to let Mordred die, when he told Arthur magic could never be welcome in Camelot. He threw away any chance he had at being accepted because he thought –  _ hoped _ – that it was the best thing to do for Arthur, the best way to keep him alive, and he hated himself for it. Not just for the words he said, but for the desperate wish that they would return to find the others making funeral preparations, the sickening relief he felt at the thought that he might have averted the future he'd been shown, the way Arthur's joy at finding Mordred healed revealed just how far over the line Merlin had let himself go.

Merlin has tried letting Mordred die, and the universe clearly wants him to stick around. Maybe,  _ maybe _ , it's time he tried letting him live.

"Okay," he says, the word barely more than a whisper. Not uncertain, just quiet, resigned. If he cannot kill Mordred now, if fate will not let him die, Merlin's options are these: he can tell Arthur Mordred is trying to free Kara and leave it up to Arthur to prevent their escape, or he can let him go. The first option ends either in Arthur killing his friend or in Mordred loathing him for trying, neither of which is acceptable.

The second option… Merlin doesn't know, but he thinks there might be a chance.

"W-what?"

"I said okay, Mordred," Merlin says. "Go."

Wide-eyed is more than just a figure of speech, now; Mordred might have been trying to convince Merlin not to prevent them leaving, but he seems to be more than a little surprised to have succeeded.

"And you won't tell Arthur the moment I turn my back," he says, too flatly disbelieving for it to actually sound like a question.

"I won't tell Arthur," Merlin confirms. "You have my word."

Mordred continues staring at him. "Or anyone else."

"You have my word," Merlin repeats, meaning it, or at least trying to.

There's something besides scepticism in Mordred's expression now, a measure of hope mixed with reluctance, a blend Merlin is familiar with: he's lost hope so many times he tries not to let himself do it anymore. He fails (this moment is pretty much proof of that), but he tries.

"Say I believe you," Mordred says slowly. "Why are you doing this?"

_ Because it's the best way I can think of to keep you from hating Arthur _ , Merlin thinks.  _ Because nothing else has worked yet _ .  _ Because I don't think you'll come back from Kara's death. Because, of the options available to me, letting you go is probably the one least likely to end with Arthur dead or hating himself for killing you. _

_ Because even the slightest chance is worth taking, and I don't think we're going to get another one. _

"I did the same," Merlin says quietly, because that, too, is the best option he has. "I hope it works out for you."

He's braced for Mordred to ask something, maybe when or who or what happened. He doesn't intend to answer (the memory of Freya is his, private, and even saying this much is more than he's ever told anyone before), but he's still expecting to be asked.

Mordred doesn't, though. He looks at Merlin, gaze cool, assessing, and just as piercing as it was when he was a child, when Kilgharrah warned him what the future could hold. He looks, silently, for long enough that Merlin starts to feel a little uncomfortable, and then Mordred nods.

"I won't forget this, Merlin," he says, the way he did all those years ago.

This time, it doesn't seem like such a bad thing.

Mordred smiles, and then he walks away.


End file.
